My Swing (MattM)

[mvmac]

I understand what you are saying. I was just looking at drills...feels or swing thoughts that could help me consistently shorten my swing/stop my arms from continually taking the club passed the line. Ill stop though.

Like I posted earlier, the pivot stuff will help shorten the arms. You might also have to do some practice making a bunch of 3/4 backswings (feel) and then have that feel become your new A4. But see how the "chest to the ground" backswing feel changes the arm swing first.

[LeftRightLeft]

Thanks Mike and Matt.  Great topic for me.   Especially with the driver and fairway woods, over-swinging is problem for me, too.   It's a pattern I've been trying to break but I seem to fall back into a lot.  In the two photos above (both at A4 -at the top), in the right picture it looks to me like the left arm has moved just a fraction farther, but it looks like the left wrist is flexing quite a bit more.  This is what I feel when it happens to me.

It's something I've done since I was a kid.  I want to complete my backswing, so I error by letting the club swing too far back, but in essence I feel like I'm losing the end of the handle.  I've thought it might have been from swinging clubs that were too heavy and it became a timing thing.  I say that because when I try to shorten my swing, I tend to get quick and transition with my shoulders instead of with a hip slide.  The problem is that going back too far is another moving part, creating more inconsistency.

At my age, I probably should not make 3/4 backswings (I'm probably nowhere near 90 degrees).   I'm not trying to railroad Matt's thread, but I'm curious if what I'm trying to do makes sense and might help Matt, too.  Matt, definitely work on that reverse K at setup.  It was something I worked on and it has helped a lot.

What I've been working on is two-fold.  I am trying to be conscious of my grip with the pinky and ring fingers of my left hand, which helps the tendency to let the handle go too far (the wrist flex at the top).  Make sure you don't build up too much tension in the left forearm, though.   The second part for me is getting the sequence right, which may not seem to apply to Matt.  I feel like I need to turn my shoulders as far as I can go (again, probably less than 90 degrees to target), but I am trying to pause with the thought of not losing the pinky and ring finger grip.  During the pause, I am consciously moving my weight to the left side (I feel like I'm sliding my left hip/leaning into my left knee).   I also want to feel my left arm dropping across my shoulders and my right arm attaching to my right-side ribs.  This seems to flatten my plane, which I think gives me a better path.  Does this make any sense?

[MattM]

Here is my best approximation for a 30% swing speed.  From what I can see it definitely looks to me like my hips stay forward or at least more so than they were before....

[mvmac]

Here is my best approximation for a 30% swing speed.  From what I can see it definitely looks to me like my hips stay forward or at least more so than they were before....

Yes and look at A4!

[MattM]

Awesome! Thats great to hear that you see the same thing i do... Since i know im on the right track ill keep doing the slower swing to groove the feel. Ill also keep focusing on the feel of point my butt at the target throughout my backswing wich helps me with the angle.

[MattM]

Ok....so....after working on this for a few days I wanted to come in here and see if I have this right at this point.

What I've felt is that when I push my hips forward toward the target I have to ensure that I actually have most of my weight on my front foot (that's because sometimes when I push my hips forward it becomes more of a lean away from the target and can take weight off my front foot) then once I'm setup correctly all I have to do is turn back for my backswing then turn forward through impact.  That seemed to work the best for me so far and has shortened my swing some.

Am I on the right track Mvmac?

[Golfingdad]

Ok....so....after working on this for a few days I wanted to come in here and see if I have this right at this point.

What I've felt is that when I push my hips forward toward the target I have to ensure that I actually have most of my weight on my front foot (that's because sometimes when I push my hips forward it becomes more of a lean away from the target and can take weight off my front foot) then once I'm setup correctly all I have to do is turn back for my backswing then turn forward through impact.  That seemed to work the best for me so far and has shortened my swing some.

Am I on the right track Mvmac?

I don't think so.  But again, everybody feels everything differently, so maybe that works for you.  But its my understanding that your weight should be fairway centered at setup.

I've been trying a similar thing at setup with bumping my hips, but I don't want to push weight forward with it too much because then I fear I'd be leaning that way, instead of more of the "reverse k" look.  Make sense?

Too much weight forward at setup just means more moving parts during the backswing as well to get the pressure back where it needs to be, I would think.

[MattM]

I don't think so.  But again, everybody feels everything differently, so maybe that works for you.  But its my understanding that your weight should be fairway centered at setup.

I've been trying a similar thing at setup with bumping my hips, but I don't want to push weight forward with it too much because then I fear I'd be leaning that way, instead of more of the "reverse k" look.  Make sense?

Too much weight forward at setup just means more moving parts during the backswing as well to get the pressure back where it needs to be, I would think.

The weight forward is a big thing for 5sk and evolvr.  They want more weight (60-40 on the left side at setup).  Then in the back swing more and more weight transfers forward as well.

The big thing with this for me is that I need to make sure that I actually have more weight on that front foot at setup and am not just leaning back to bump the hips.  I was absolutely destroying the ball yesterday on the course and shot a 38 on the front nine then on the back It all went to hell.

I suspect it was because I was not focusing on bumping my hips forward whilst still keeping most of my weight on the front foot.  I can tell when I'm not doing this when I start to hit nasty duckhooks.  I would assume it's because my body gets "stuck" and causes me to just turn in my downswing instead of sliding my hips.  That's just my assumption I could be absolutely wrong though, but I am making massive improvement and I think my swing length has actually shortened as well!

[iacas]

The weight forward is a big thing for 5sk and evolvr.  They want more weight (60-40 on the left side at setup).  Then in the back swing more and more weight transfers forward as well.

In Phoenix for the Newport Cup, but I'll assume you made a typo here? Weight and pressure (more the latter) transfers to the trail foot during the backswing. It doesn't go forward.

The rest of your post is probably pretty accurate.

[MattM]

Sorry iacas i take lunch at my desk and try to multitask which gets me in trouble... you are right thats what i meant to say.

[mvmac]

The weight forward is a big thing for 5sk and evolvr.  They want more weight (60-40 on the left side at setup).  Then in the back swing more and more weight transfers forward as well.

Weight forward on the downswing is a biggie for 5SK (or all good golf swings). The backswing is a different story, like Erik said, the pressure transfers to the trail side. At A1, things are close to 50/50. You may feel something different but definitely don't "load" left on the backswing. Not sure where you got that idea ;-)

[MattM]

I didnt mean to say that...sorry...

[MattM]

Definately found out where my big buggaboo is with this new swing. Played sat with it at the course. Front nine iwas hitting the perfect draw! Hit six outof nine greens in reg and had two birdies on the front for a 37. They team us up with a guy who would not stop talking though... on the back. I lose my swing thought which is to push my hip towards the target but keep weight forward and sure enough massive duck hook after duck hook... i finally figure out on the last hole that im not focusing on weight forward in my setup when i push my hip forward which was causing me to sway back on my backswing and keep it back through the swing. 18Th tee i step up and push the hip and concentrate on weight forwad and sure enough hit a gorgious high and long drsw that winds up 50 yards off the green. I promptly stick two feet from the hole and tap in my birdie. Im happy i found the problem but its going to be something i have to really concentrate on..

[MattM]

Here is my latest face on driver swing.  I'm really trying to concentrate on having the weight forward at setup.  That keeps me from swaying backwards somehow.

[MattM]

So my butt looks like it's still ahead of my head in the backswing which I was using to tell me that I still had secondary axis tilt.  Does it look to everyone else like I'm doing it somewhat correctly?

[mvmac]

You're still taking out too much of your axis tilt on the backswing.

[ygmondoux]

It's a good swing. Maybe just a bit too much rotation oriented and complicated. You should try learning to swing your arms with this easy drill: Feet together wedge swings with a high normal finish and hit until you feel confortable doing it.

Just my 2 cents.

[MattM]

You're still taking out too much of your axis tilt on the backswing.

So....I went to Florida last week and didn't get any time to practice.....  We stayed with my GFs aunt and uncle and the uncle wanted to play on Saturday because he knew I had gotten my handicap down to an 8.5 on Game Golf (I've never played with him).  I get to the course which is beautiful, and btw I've never played on Bermuda which really hurt my chipping/pitching as well.

Anyway I get out on the course and proceed to Duck Hook EVERYTHING!  I think I'm setting up correctly but I've only been using this swing for three weeks or so.  I really try not to straighten my axis tilt and that seems to actually make the duck hooks worse!  Nothing I try stops it.  Needless to say I wind up shooting a 103 which is absolutely embarrassing!

I guess my question for this is....is there a typical problem that occurs that would cause this massive duck hook fiasco in every swing?  On some swings I even tried to physically slide my hips extremely far forward in the downswing thinking it would stop the duckhooks but it seemed to make them worse.  Any ideas?